Christopher de Bellaigue
Christopher de Bellaigue (born 1971 in London) is a journalist who has worked on the Middle East and South Asia since 1994. His work mostly chronicles developments in Iran and Turkey.
De Bellaigue obtained a BA and MA in Oriental Studies from the University of Cambridge, where he was a student at Fitzwilliam College.[1] His first book, In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs: A Memoir of Iran, was shortlisted for the Royal Society of Literature's Ondaatje Prize. In 2007-2008, he was a visiting fellow at St Antony's College, Oxford, where he began work on an anticipated biography of the Iranian prime minister, Mohammad Mossadegh.
De Bellaigue is the Tehran correspondent for The Economist and is a frequent contributor to the New York Review of Books, Granta, and The New Yorker, among other publications. He lives in London with his wife Bita Ghezelayagh, who is an Iranian architect, and two children. [2] He converted to Iranian Shiism sect of Islam in the early part of this decade.
He wrote "Rebel Land: Among Turkey's Forgotten People", an account of the three years he lived in Varto, after publishing an essay in the New York Review of Books about the Turkish "deportations and massacres" of Armenians in 1915 and being told by Professor James R. Russell that he was engaging in genocide denial and scolded by editor Robert Silvers for acting as an "apologist" for the Turks.[3]
In 2012, de Bellaigue's book about Mohammad Mossadegh, "Patriot of Persia", came out.[4]
Books
- "Patriot of Persia" (2012)
- "Rebel Land: Among Turkey's Forgotten People" (2009)
- The Struggle for Iran (2007)
- In the Rose Garden of the Martyrs: A Memoir of Iran (2005)
Documentaries
- Iran and Britain (BBC Four, February 2009 [3])
External links
- Profile at NYRB
- Interview at AsiaSource
- Articles in Granta
- Articles in Harper's
- Articles in the London Review of Books
References
- ^ "Cambridge in America Books". Cambridge in America. 2010. Retrieved 2010-11-30.
- ^ "Diary". London Review of Books. 2001-07-05. Retrieved 2010-08-27.
- ^ A Look as the Snarled Past of Armenians and Turks," Dwight Garner, New York Times, March 3, 2010, [1]
- ^ Patriot of Persia by Christopher de Bellaigue – review, James Buchan, The Guardian, March 2, 2012, [2]